Rebuilt

These four stark walls are familiar.

I wish that I could tell you why.

The walls give me no clues. They simply stare back at me with intent. Challenging me.

It feels as though I have stared at them for hours. Perhaps years. Decades.

But all I can say for certain is that my eyes have been open for less than an hour.

They cracked open into a sliver of light and have not shut down since.

My sight is strange and slightly uneven. It has a synthetic veneer that gives an alien sepia tone to everything it settles on.

These eyes are not my own.

This room however. I have seen this room before.

After waking I have decided to walk around the space, in the hope of finding something resembling a clue. Anything that can give me an implication, an idea of why I’m here. A suggestion of where I am.

In order to move from my seat I have to step over an object on the shiny floor in front of me. The object looks strange to me at first. Curious and fascinating. I crouch with great difficulty to carry out an inspection. It takes me a moment before I understand what I am looking at. It is dusty and brittle. The exposed surface stretched across sharp contours, breaking in places into jagged papery tears. The rest is concealed by a selection of equally time worn materials. I roll the object onto its back in order to investigate further. The sight that greets me brings back knowledge that I did not know I possessed.

My strange eyes are looking at a human body. The bulging eyes, dry flaking skin and bones struggling to push through for exposure suggest that it has been here for a very long time.

Perhaps if I had a nose I would have smelt it.

I stare impassively at the husk before moving on.

At first my movements are awkward and stilted. My joints creak and scream as they move. As though tough and unforgiving materials are being dragged and scraped across each other before settling into an engineered fluidity.

It would be wrong of me to describe the sensations as painful. They are more uncomfortable and unpleasant than agonising.

An irritation.

The room is ordered and neat, corpse not withstanding.

Machinery lines the walls. A selection of desks and chairs are dwarfed by a large glass window. The window looks down onto a vast steel area, circular in shape and lined with more chairs. All empty. It would seem that I am standing in some kind of observation deck.

Blank monitors gaze into the space. Steel tables shine sparsely in the dim light.

The monitors and screens all sit blinking. Some simply have a single red light flickering like an inquisitive eye. All these machines are probably of no use to me. All on standby and coated in thick grey dust.

Still, a need to know gets the better of me.

I press the power switch on one of the sleek contraptions and after what seems like a great effort it begins to flicker into life.

I sit at the screen and begin to type methodically.

It would appear that everything has come on at the same time. Either by a sudden surge of electricity or a back up generator randomly bursting into life.

Is that why I’m here? Have I just been activated?

My hands are not mine either.

They have skin.

But it is not my skin.

The fingers move across the keys with an unnatural speed. They tap against the letters and numbers with weight. A weight that no human hand could ever achieve.

Password protected.

Of course it is.

There is a small green pad on the side of the computer. In the faint light I can see the contours and lines of an unknown fingerprint.

I lift and stare at my inhuman hands with my inhuman eyes. What are the chances that my fingerprint will open this machine’s secrets? I press my thumb against the pad in vain. Nothing.

I guess you need real fingers.

It only occurs to me now that I am not hungry or thirsty. I have no idea how long I have been here but I know that I have been asleep for some time. Or at least a state that resembles sleep. I have woken up and I do not feel any urge to eat. No great need to urinate.

No urge to drink.

Do I even have a mouth?

I dare not look in a mirror. I am perversely grateful that this room does not appear to contain one.

I notice that one machine in the corner is cleaner than the others. Dust has been brushed away and the old leather chair in front of it is tattered and worn. It has clearly been sat in much more recently than the others.

The computer also has a green pad.

Without thinking my head turns on its unnatural neck to the unfortunate person on the floor. I stand and step forward, my strange hips allowing me to bend down.

I am starting to get used to this bizarre body of mine. I am rather starting to like it.

I take hold of the old dry hand and turn it to the light. Perhaps this might just work. At this point I am willing to try anything.

As I am contemplating this there is a crack and dry splintering sound. I look down to see that the hand and a large part of the forearm have come away in my grip. I do not know if this is because of the age of the corpse or my new proportionate strength.

Perhaps it is a combination of both.

It is immaterial.

With the severed hand I move swiftly to the console and place the dead thumb against the pad.

The screen immediately flickers into life.

In other circumstances I might feel elation at such a development. That emotion however is currently sat cowering in the distance. As though it is locked away until I can find the key.

The dead hand falls to the floor beside me. It is so old and withered that it breaks apart. If I were to look down at this point I might experience a modicum of relief that I used it in time. My vision however is drawn entirely to the screen.

A barrage of information hits me. My new brain functions at rapid speed and I find myself entrenched in the events of the last few decades.

I am able to scroll through a selection of pictures and newspaper reports. Experiments have been carried out in order to battle the problems resulting from an overpopulated planet.

The lack of food. Dwindling resources.

The difficulty of finding people willing to take part in the menial jobs required for society to flourish.

Artificial intelligence to be used in warfare.

Territorial disputes.

I realize that I am looking at the final stages of a project that should have revolutionised the survival of the human species.

But it didn’t.

The people involved in this research ploughed forward because they could. Never stopping to consider whether or not they should.

Somewhere amongst all of the tests and experiments things had gone wrong. Tests upon animals. Tests upon human subjects. Tests upon bacteria.

Tests upon living tissue.

A few words are dotted through these different articles and reams of test data.

Contagion.

Quarantine.

Mortality rate.

The human race are gone.

All of this goes into my head and processes very quickly. I continue to scroll through the information until a picture causes me to stop dead in my tracks.

Two faces appear on the screen in front of me.

A young man. Handsome. Deep blue eyes that suggest an underlying sadness. He has a day of stubble and an eyebrow ring. The familiarity of this face is deeply troubling. I resist the urge to run my strange hand over my own features.

I force myself to look at the other picture.

A young woman stares forlornly from the flickering glass screen. Her hair is a dirty blonde colour and hangs haphazardly around her face. Her eyes are hazel and striking. Her mouth is trying very hard to smile but appears to be losing the battle.

She has the sort of face that has managed to cling to its ravaged beauty despite witnessing many hardships.

I am drawn however to the jewellery that nestles against her tanned throat.

If I had a throat myself this is where I would take a sharp intake of breath. The sepia filter of my eyes cannot draw my attention away from the necklace.

The chain is delicate and golden and shines gently against her skin. It dangles gracefully and leads down to a small polished heart with a small clasp.

Why do I recognise that locket?

Why do I know what picture is inside?

Suddenly the space where my brain would have been goes into overload. Images spiral through my consciousness. Grainy images of faces. People. Places. I see a young man walking into a jewellery shop and talking to a pretty assistant. He hands her some money and she smiles. She touches his arm and laughs, perhaps a little jealous that he is purchasing this locket for someone else.

For this girl.

Nicola.

The name hits me hard in my centre.

Even though I know that life on this planet has ceased the fate of this young woman has a profound impact on me. I finally find the emotion of sadness buried deep within the rusted filing cabinet of my soul. If my body was physically capable I would shed tears. Instead I sit in dumbfounded silence.

I switch off the computer and return to my previous seat.

I do not know what I am.

Slowly and surely I am beginning to understand who I was.

That information has suddenly become more important than anything else.

I do not know what the world outside looks like. Nor do I know how many people are left. Perhaps there are others like me.

I walk to the door of my solitary room. Using my new synthetic strength I tear the metal door from the frame.

I step outside.